With a clear statement of the theoretical issues in the debates about secularization and post-secularism, ‘Religion and the State: A Comparative Sociology’ considers a number of major case studies – from China, Europe, Singapore and South Asia – in order to understand the rise of public religions in the modern state. By distinguishing between political secularization – the separation of state and religion – and social secularization – the transformation of the everyday practice of religion – this volume offers an integrating framework within which to analyze these different societies.

Water Security in the Middle East argues that, while conflicts over transboundary water systems in the Middle East do occur, they tend not to be violent nor are they the primary cause of a war in this region. The contributors in this collection of essays place water disputes in larger political, historical and scientific contexts and discuss how the humanities and social sciences contribute towards this understanding. The authors contend that international sharing of scientific and technological advances can significantly increase access to water and improve water quality. While scientific advances can and should increase adaptability to changing environmental conditions, especially climate change, national institutional reform and the strengthening of joint commissions are vital. The contributors indicate ways in which cooperation can move from simple coordination to sophisticated, adaptive and equitable modes of water management.

Conditions of malnutrition, conflict, or a combination of both characterize many Arab countries, but this was not always so. As in much of the developing world, the immediate post-independence period represented an age of hope and relative prosperity. But imperialism did not sleep while these countries developed, and it soon intervened to destroy these post-independence achievements. The two principal defeats and losses of territory to Israel in 1967 and 1973, as well as the others that followed, left in their wake more than the destruction of assets and the loss of human lives: the Arab World lost its ideology of resistance. The Unmaking of Arab Socialism is an attempt to understand the reasons for Arab world's developmental descent from the pinnacle of Arab socialism to its present desolate conditions through an examination of the post-colonial histories of Egypt, Syria, and Iraq.